“My teeth are clenched, my jaw is tight, and my pulse is pounding in my head. I’ve never hated anyone more than in this moment. The intensity of what I wish I could do to him right now is even scaring me.”

Forcing someone to do something or not do something never works out for the person doing the enforcing. Dean Holder learns this in a very hard way. Being naturally protective of his twin sister, Lesslie, Holder takes matters into his own hands when it comes to her. Grayson (you remember him), is a douche (yeah, he was always that way) and while Les is at home, missing her boyfriend; Grayson is hanging out at a party with some random girl straddled on his lap. Rather than tell his sister, Holder forces Grayson to end his relationship with her (over the phone no less), not knowing that it would be the final nail in his sister’s coffin. The tragedy that follows leaves Holder with more than unanswered questions…he’s left with a never-ending guilt. Guilt over Les, his mother, and most of all, losing Hope.

“I don’t know if she’s in a place where she can see me right now, or if she’s even in a place at all, but in case she can see this…I want her to know how her selfish decision affected me. How hopeless she left me. Literally hopeless. And completely alone. And so, so incredibly sorry.”

When all else fails after Les’s death, Holder starts to write. He writes in a journal he found in her room; a journal that was meant for her to express what was happening in her life…instead it was left empty. Pages and pages of nothing. That is all that is left of Les; and Holder, as much as he won’t admit, isn’t ready to let her go. So, he writes. He writes to Les almost daily; maybe it’s his way of grieving or just a way to feel closer to the one person he thought he could save. He had already lost Hope, losing Les was just too much.

“What are the chances that the only two girls in my life I’ve ever loved…I’ve lost? It’s killing me piece by piece every single day. I know I should probably find a way to try to get over it…to let go of the blame. But to be honest, I don’t want to get over it. I don’t want to forget that my inability to protect either of you is why I’m the only one of us left…Yeah, I definitely need a reminder. Maybe I should get a tattoo.”

Hopeless is Sky’s story. In Losing Hope, we learn the ins and outs of Dean Holder and how he came to be the “bad-boy” we met in Hopeless. What makes his POV different is that it starts prior to his chance meeting of the girl we learn to be Hope. What makes it the same is that we get to experience Sky/Hope’s story again (which was amazing) through Holder’s eyes. Maybe it’s just me, but I love books from the guys POV…something about being in their heads.

“I wonder if it’s possible for people to fall in love with a person one characteristic at a time, or if you fall for the entire person at once.”

I fell in love with Holder all over again in this book. Colleen Hoover is a master when it comes to capturing the feelings of both her characters and her readers. My heart hurt all over again for completely different (and yet the same) reasons. In the words of Holder: